What finally did it for you?

What finally did it for me was that I was 250 lbs, pregnant and I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes. Shortly after my father was diagnosed with diabetes and it was so bad they had to remove his leg. At that point I said, 'screw this, I will NOT get diabetes' and I started kicking butt. I went from a 92% chance of getting diabetes to a 11% chance. I'm not all the way where I want to be but that's a pretty good freakin start.

Pictures from a vacation finally did it for me. When my middle daughter told me that Pooh Bear and I could share clothes that was my drawing line right there. With my DH deploying again though it's also more incentive to drop these unwanted lbs before he comes home in a year. I figure that wanting to ditch 35lbs in 12 months is a reasonable time frame. Now that I have MFP it's a little easier to do.

I was diagnosed with diabetes about 6 years ago, but I never took it seriously until a few days ago. I've been having trouble getting the blood sugar numbers down and saw an ad for Lantus insulin. I found myself thinking about how I might be on insulin in a couple months. That thought hit me like a brick between the eyes. All I have to do is lose 40-60 lbs to get my diabetes into complete remission, and here I am playing with the thought of taking insulin. "What a lazy bum I am", is what I thought. Suddenly I knew I had to eat less, a lot less, and really curb the carbs to get my blood sugar under control, so that I wouldn't be dependent on medication so early in the game. It's difficult if not impossible to reverse diabetic damage, and I was on my way to permanently ruining my body all for the sake of my taste buds.

So here I go, eating half what I used to eat and eating right to keep the calories around 1000 (I'm less than 5 ft. tall and 51 y.o.) I don't look for food that tastes great but will harm me; I look for food that I like that is also healthy, and then I eat 1 serving of it. No seconds, no desserts, no fried food, no "just one bite won't hurt" bite of anything. It's all measured and enjoyed, and then I walk away with no regrets. My doc once said that if I had already tasted it all, then why bother with tasting it again, and that's true. I know what everything tastes like, so there is no need to taste it again. Eat the healthy, and look at the rest as unedible.

I also used to use food for comfort as well, and I've binged and starved with the best of them. My internist today asked if I had the bingeing under control. I could answer yes with full conviction. I finally got it into my head that if hungry isn't the problem, then food isn't the answer.

It's just simply time to do what's best for me.

Sherri

Stepping on the scale! Once I heard my dad (who had been overweight most my life) was losing weight and lost 15lbs, I decided to bite the bullet and get on the scale after not knowing my weight for probably a couple of years. It was 218lbs, didn't even expect it to be much over 200 if even that. That's when I realized I had been putting it off for too long.

Especially with the way I had been going last year: still sticking to my job's schedule (6:30am-3pm), no breakfast, fast food for lunch, a long nap after work and eating late in the evening. That coupled with going out several times a week to shows with friends and drinking was 100% not good for my body and likely how I put on the pounds even faster.

Discovering MyFitnessPal and clicking "Complete This Entry" for my first day of watching calorie intake and seeing how much less I'd be in 5 weeks was so compelling, the community here just keeps me going, too! I can't wait to step on the scale first thing in the morning everyday now!

My age! I'm turning 27 and have been a size 11/13 (I'm only 5') since I got married at 18 years old. I've spend most my 20's chubby. I'm going to finally get my body back. Was a size 3 in high school. I want to get down to at least 120 (156 now). I want to enjoy these last couple years feeling "young". I hear it's harder to lose weight after 30. I want to live longer, feel better, be confident, swim in public, have more energy, wear cuter clothes, etc. I'm sick of being jealous of other people's nice figures without cottage cheese and lumps. I want to be happy when I look in the mirror!

I had a miscarriage when I was 15 weeks pregnant. One of the nurses at my OB's office told me that fat girls have a higher chance of miscarriage. I don't like feeling responsible for what happened, so I am determined to lose all of this extra weight before we start trying again.

I noticed a lot of us have stated one place or another that we've tried several times to lose weight, before we came here. So what was that thing(s) that finally pushed you into serious mode. What made all the difference?

For me it was life insurance. I had been fat (technically obese) for a very long time. I probably weighed 260-270 when I graduated high school and 290 or so when I graduated college (just guessing since I never stepped on scales). Over the years I slowly worked my way up to 350. I knew I needed to lose weight, but never really made an effort to do it. Sure, every now and then I'd get motivated and try to jog around the block or something, but I always ended up going 100 yards or so and then walking back home and sitting on the couch. In hindsight, it was a miserable existence.

After my wife had our second child, I decided it would be a good idea to raise my life insurance coverage. "No problem," they said, "We'll just come to your house to take a little blood and a few measurements and we'll be good to go." Well, they came. About two weeks later I got a letter saying that my request to increase coverage was declined. They gave me a number to call if I wanted to know why, so I called. The lady on the phone very politely and professionally explained to me that my weight to height ratio was too high and that my bloodwork indicated high levels in places where it shouldn't.

That was my wakeup call. I plan to lose another 40-50 pounds and then call them again. This time I suspect the results will be different.

Bigger picture though, I'm so glad to be healthy and active now. I can run and play with my kids all day long and they'll get tired long before I do. Instead of sitting on the couch and watching them play, I now play WITH them. Every facet of my life is so much better after losing almost 100 pounds. It will be better still when I hit my goal.

This picture



Need to point out here that I'm NOT a Nazi sympathiser! I was at a 1940's weekend!

Looking good next to my sexy military man.